


Claws and Crossbows

by KevlarMasquerade (nightsstarr)



Category: DCU, DCU - Comicverse
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Damian is Batman, F/M, Lian is Red Arrow, Mar'i is Catwoman because plotbunnies, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-16
Updated: 2013-05-16
Packaged: 2017-12-12 02:16:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/805981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightsstarr/pseuds/KevlarMasquerade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The children of Batman, Arsenal, and Nightwing all meet up on the streets of Gotham. One's avenging the night, the other's running around in a low-cut black Nomex suit, and the last one is just trying to figure out where she fits in the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Claws and Crossbows

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not sure how this fits in any continuity =x Sorry. Kind of Earth-22 with Damian instead of Ibn and no Kansas getting blown up or Magog and Superman and Wonder Woman's baby. Or main continuity (pre-New 52) if Mar'i existed and was somehow the same age as Damian.

I hate patrolling with Batman.

Admittedly, Damian Wayne is not the friendliest person, even on a good day. But on patrol, he’s so much more into upholding the bat-stoicism that the Wayne men (excluding Nightwing, most days) seem so fond of upholding.

Plus, sometimes he gets mad. He’s not like Red Hood—he’s in control of his anger. Rarely does he go ballistic or allow himself to beat relatively harmless thieves until they’re bloody. He’s only done that once when I’ve been with him, and that was after she showed up. Batman’s anger is the kind that only adds a bitter flavor to our silence. It makes it tense. Maybe I take after my dad, but I hate tension.

We split up a lot on patrols when I visit. It’s better than me making fun of him for hoarding cats at the Manor and him making cracks about how I’m no good without arrows. That’s crap, anyway, and we both know it—just because I can’t hit a bull’s eye with a shuriken doesn’t mean I can’t throw them at all.

Gotham is always so gloomy. It makes Star City look like Tampa, comparatively. The night isn’t that dark, because of all the lights, especially in the business district, but there are never any stars. A heavy blanket of dark clouds always hovers, so thick it might fall down on the whole damn city.

I see a flicker of color—orange or red. Or pink.

“Batman,” I hiss into the earpiece. “Have you seen her tonight?”

“I… no. You have a visual?”

“Yeah. Don’t interrupt.”

“You know damn well that I—”

“You mess everything up, Bats. I’m scheduling in some girl talk. No boys allowed.”

“Tt. I’m on my way.”

Stupid Batman. Just because He Is The Night doesn’t mean I can’t boss him around every once in a while.

I nock an arrow, suck in a breath, and hold it. She’s around. I saw her.

A movement to my right and I let the string loose, shooting exactly where I saw the shadow. Off course; she’s gone now. That was a warning shot. I don’t miss.

She’s fast. Maybe it’s something she inherited from her father, but she moves in the shadows so quickly and seamlessly that I have no idea how she ended up on the building across from me. She’s not hiding, either.

Her arms are folded behind her back and she lets her eyes glow. She really looks like a cat.

Slowly, I nock another arrow. “Catwoman,” I greet her.

“Now, Red Arrow,” she purrs. “You can call me by my name. We’re old friends, in case you’ve forgotten.”

“No, I haven’t forgotten,” I snap and I pull back on the string a little. “Looks like you have, though.”

She sighed, putting her hands on her hips. “Can’t a girl have a little fun?”

I release the string and the arrow lands where her feet were. Damn acrobatics lessons from daddy made her nimble, and she flips neatly through the air even as I take my shot. She lands in a crouch, and because her eyes are still glowing I can see her tilt her head.

“I think you like our banter, Lian. You’re not playing for keeps.”

She wants me to stop aiming at her feet and take a shot at her torso. Because she’s nuts. I grit my teeth, considering throwing a comeback at her. I decide instead to nock another arrow and leap, releasing it as I jump. Landing with bent knees on the edge of the building, I pinwheel my arms to regain my balance.

Catwoman darts to the side, so quick, so quiet, flame licking through the air as her hair burns through the cool air. No time to knock another arrow so I reach for my crossbow. The lights flickering from the fire in her hair are distracting, throwing shadows around us that grow and shrink with the flames in her dark hair.

She tackles me and we fall together. I try to kick her off, but she grabs my wrist tight as she plucks her whip from her belt and flicks the end onto a fire escape, which unfurls under our collective weight, depositing us on the sidewalk.

It’s an odd game we play. She’s screwing around and it always makes me so mad, but we don’t want each other to get hurt. I aim another kick and shoot my crossbow as she ducks. But I accounted for that and it’s not an arrow. Polymerized rope, fireproof just for her, shoots out and directs the arrow around her. I have her tangled in my line, and I drag her into an alley with me so that whoever lives in the apartment above us doesn’t catch us when they come to check on their fire escape.

“Why do you do this?” I growl at her, digging my hands into her shoulders.

“Why do you care what I do?” she retorts, narrowing her glowing eyes.

I could slap her. “It’s not fair. You were my friend.”

“Things change.”

“Screw you. You’re not the one who should be there. Your parents love you. Your parents—”

“My parents, my parents,” she snaps. “It’s so very easy for you, Lian, isn’t it? Doing what daddy wants to you to do, taking up the mantle, letting him groom you from birth to be some kind of Legolas-Katniss Everdeen-archer fatale—”

“Don’ you dare talk about what my parents want me to be. It was my choice.” I bring her back to my point after taking a breath to gain some semblance of control over myself. “It’s in my blood, villainy. Assassination. I fought it, Mar’i. What the hell is your excuse?”

“Excuse me,” she says, affronted. “Assassination has never been my game. Second of all, you know parentage has no sway over what you do. There’s no genetic code for villainy or terrorism. Say, Lian, have you had the urge to blow up any countries lately?” she quips sarcastically.

“How dare you!” I punch her in the jaw. I don’t usually go for punches in the face—they sort of hurt my hand, and there are much better nerve-clusters to hit that can do fun things like paralyze someone. She falls, and I wonder why she hasn’t so much as attempted to get loose from my binds, but I don’t think about it too much.

“It’s people like you that make civilians suspicious of people like me.” I grab her by the hair, which isn’t too hot near her scalp, and I make her look at me. “It’s people like you who—”

“It’s people like me who make people like you question themselves, isn’t it?” she asks gently, like she understands, and the pink glow fades from her eyes. “Sometimes you think that maybe you should have gone with your mother. Eke out a living as an assassin or a thief or whatever’s in demand.”

All my life, it’s been me and my dad. He tried to include my mom in my life, but she repeatedly proved that that wasn’t a great idea. Some girls have daddy issues, and I guess I’m lucky that my dad’s always been there for me. But being a little girl growing up without a mother is so different than being a little girl growing up without a father, or even a little boy without a father or a little boy without a mother. There were so many things I had to figure out on my own. Yeah, Mrs. Grayson was there for a while, but she left, too, eventually.

Mar’i had done what part of me—a small part of me, obviously, but a part that was still there—always wanted me to do. And she hadn’t even done it to gain anything that was fundamentally important to her identity, like a mother figure. She did it for fun.

That’s what got me so mad.

“Screw you,” I murmur again, and as quick as a flash of lightning her eyes glow pink and two beams shoot out at me, knocking me on my back against the opposite wall of the alley.

Now she’s working on cutting the bonds, and I’m running out of time to make my mark. I nock an arrow and I pull back the string. A shot from this close won’t be good, but I’m so mad that not only do I not care, I’m kind of glad.

The satisfying twang is interrupted before the string even stops vibrating by a batarang so sharp that it keeps going after slicing my arrow in two, stopping it in its short journey, and embeds into the brick wall.

“Damn it, Batman!” I growl, but he ignores me and he marches over to Catwoman, who’s shaking my polymerized rope away from her arms and glaring at me. He takes her by the arm and pulls her to her feet roughly.

I avert my eyes as she puts her arms around his neck. Their meetings always escalate pretty quickly, which is not only embarrassing to watch, it’s frustrating.

It’s beginning to drizzle and I have no intention of staying out in Batman’s city getting soaked, so I get my motorcycle from where I stowed it earlier and I get back to the Batcave. A shower makes me feel better, and I never thought, growing up, that after seeing Mar’i I’d feel like I need to shower.

When I get out, dressed in civvies and toweling my hair off, Batman’s sitting at his multiple monitors, staring at the screen.

I don’t ask if he brought Catwoman in. I’m not stupid.

“You can’t lose it like that,” he says reproachfully without bothering to look at me.

“Please. It wasn’t like I was using the crossbow. Her suit would probably have stopped it before it did any damage.” It’s the truth, and he knows it.

“We can’t bank on ‘probably’.” That’s the truth, too, and I know it. “Control yourself or stick to Lian Harper when you’re here.”

“Fine,” I say, and I don’t say which one I’ll do.

“Get some sleep, Harper,” he says dismissively. “Sun’s almost up. I’ll just be a few minutes more, anyway.”

I grunt in agreement and I trudge up the many stairs. I’m accosted by Damian’s cats when I come up from the cave and I make my way to the main guest room, which he keeps for me and Robert and any of the gang from the Titans.

There’s nothing to be done about how Mar’i Grayson chooses to spend her nights, but I really have to do something about the way I feel about it.


End file.
